Tim Bray, New Google Employee, Says He Wants To Kill The iPhone

businessinsider.com:

Tim Bray, co-inventor of XML, has joined Google as "Developer Advocate," with a focus on Android.

Tim announced and explained his new role at Google on his blog--and, in a move that is extraordinary for normally buttoned up Googlers, expounded on his hatred of the iPhone and all it stands for.

Read the whole story: businessinsider.com

Comments

[Angelus2007]

01:34 PM on 03/16/2010

Is it just me, or does this guy look like Brett Favre dressed as Indiana Jones?

[jsgaetano]

05:42 PM on 03/16/2010

Gif me the iPhone, I gif you the wheep!

[fcsakes]

08:56 AM on 03/16/2010

If you don't like something, why would you buy one? There's plenty of competition out there.

[Cryostatic]

07:54 AM on 03/16/2010

Well, HuffPo blows another one way out of proportion.

All this guy (a co-inventor of XML and apparently, internet purist) is saying is that he hates the iPhone's closed platform, even if he loves the hardware and design. He doesn't like the way Apple's system stifles development.

Nowhere in the article do I see him claiming that he wants to "Kill" the iPhone.

[Eris23]

09:10 AM on 03/16/2010

Yep. HP is just awful with the headlines. Not only do I not take anything this place does seriously, but I've blocked all their ads as a result. No revenue from my traffic.

[jsgaetano]

05:44 PM on 03/16/2010

> He doesn't like the way Apple's system stifles development.

I'm not an Apple apologist by any means, but this is lunacy. The iPhone has more apps than any other phone (even though they do have to get approved by Apple). That doesn't sound stifling to me.

[dmsdzinr]

07:40 AM on 03/16/2010

If ANYONE wants to "kill" the iPhone, here is a suggestion, MAKE A BETTER PRODUCT or Shut the He11 UP!

[GunnyJ]

06:20 AM on 03/16/2010

People used to bark the same thing about Windows...... Good luck with this new venture. By the way, I love my iphone!

[rougebaisers]

02:20 AM on 03/16/2010

Good luck with all that.

[rougebaisers]

02:21 AM on 03/16/2010

Another apple innovation thief.

[RGKahn]

11:15 PM on 03/15/2010

"Tim Bray, New Google Employee, Says He Wants To Kill The iPhone",,, That is so not going to happen.

[GoDogGo]

10:30 PM on 03/15/2010

I guess it's just me but Google is getting seriously creepy. Their omnipresence, the privacy breeches, the censorship in other countries... It's not real comforting. And now, wanting to "k///" a platform that their users genuinely enjoy?

You may not like Apple, but what does this say about what Google will do to a competitor YOU like?

[KriTiKiT]

09:10 PM on 03/15/2010

good.

[chuck prebys]

06:31 PM on 03/15/2010

Haaaaaa......
Everyone wants to 'kill' the iphone.
Why not just 'kill' the wheel.
If you ever get close to 'killing' the iphone, Apple will simply unlock all those features we know it could do but are limited by the corporate office.

[jsarets]

03:11 AM on 03/16/2010

...which is a big part of the reason why many people dislike Apple.

The only Apple products I own are two Apple TVs. I hacked firmware and erased the software and use them as thin clients that netboot and remote desktop from the very powerful (and loud!) server I keep in a closet. One is my workstation and the other is my media center.

The hardware is brilliant and a great value, as long as you get rid of the Apple junk that turns it into a special-purpose lifestyle appliance. Apple makes design-centric products that spring forth from a set of use-case scenarios that some culture snob figured encompassed everything people should want to do with the product.

When Apple says "think different", there's an unstated, "...like us". It's a limited hang-out, a social construct built on a tribal phenomenon whereby humans seek acceptance in conformist groups that define themselves in terms of what makes them different from everyone else.

As much as we want to be unique, we need to fit in, and Apple is the app for that.

[blogisti]

05:38 PM on 03/15/2010

The fifth commandment.

Thou shalt not kill the iphone.

It is written. So it be done. Amen and amen.

[Eris23]

04:13 PM on 03/15/2010

Unless I'm blind, I saw no use of the word "kill" in the article or the blog entry. What a shocker.

[aferr1]

03:06 PM on 03/15/2010

Yet they have an iPhone app.

[poster1122]

02:21 PM on 03/15/2010

Good for him. Competition is a good thing. Hopefully, it'll force both companies to improve their products.

[Wide Stance]

01:42 PM on 03/15/2010

"As of now, they’re selling around 90K iPhones per day compared to around 60K Android handsets. It’s a horse race!"

A one horse race. 60K is ALL android handsets combined. The iPhone is winning by a mile. The problem with Android being open source is fragmentation, which I said would be the problem before the first handset was released.

Google is disingenuous when they say they want to kill the iPhone; what they don't want is Apple/MS controlling mobile search, the new search battleground. Google designed Android to get more google search boxes in the the hands of mobile users to drive *ad revenue* to Google. Android is free and open source, designed to spread like a virus. It was not a consumer friendly strategy, and not one that engenders a lot of loyalty. Google doesn't want to be in the hardware business, and they aren't (HTC and Motorola are). Supporting Android down the road a year or two is going to be a nightmare for small developers, but not for handset makers who can modify the OS willy-nilly and roll a new firmware with each new handset.

[Sloane7]

01:47 PM on 03/15/2010

The truth is, I like the Google search engine. But I'm finding what they are doing so sleazy that if Apple switched search engines, I'd support it.

[Wide Stance]

03:15 PM on 03/15/2010

Google used to be a great company, in some ways they still are, but in others they are downright Machiavellian. Android was a calculated response intended to maintain search domination, a Microsoft-type move, but colder (and that's scary).

In the final analysis, Apple could very well benefit from Android when people start to see the headaches of the culture Google created, who it is intended to serve, and how. Apple, despite its faults, will never fragment, and will always maintain a consumer/product focus. I can't see Apple selling consumer data like Google does. I hope Apple does create their own search engine, one with privacy features. (I am increasingly using ixquick/Startpage.)

[Kache]

09:53 PM on 03/15/2010

Wow, what rock do you guys live under. This has nothing to do with search. It has everything to do with Chrome OS and cloud computing, where the iPhone will be a useless brick.

[Wide Stance]

10:23 PM on 03/15/2010

Ummm, bullsh1t. Ad revenue accounts for 97% of Google's revenue, with only a tiny fraction of that coming from mobile. The cloud is Google's pipe dream, ad revenue is its bread and butter.

http://www.thestandard.com/news/2009/01/22/picture-guess-where-google-gets-97-its-revenue

[Wide Stance]

01:56 AM on 03/16/2010

from Wall Street Journal:

A Google executive says the price of ads on phones is growing quickly and could exceed that of ads on desktops — although he didn’t give a time frame for such a shift.

Mr. Gundotra [vp of engineering for mobile applications] said search traffic on phones has “gone up five times in the past two years,” and Google is trying to move rapidly to make sure it can translate its advantage in desktop search to smartphones. He didn’t say what percentage of search queries are from mobile devices, but analysis this week from Thomas Weisel Partners suggests it’s greater than 10%.